Celeigh Cardinal wins 2020’s Indigenous artist Juno Award

Peace Country artist Celeigh Cardinal won 2020’s Juno Award for Indigenous artist or group of the year at a live-streamed ceremony on Monday evening.

Grande Prairie’s Cardinal, who now lives in Edmonton, had been shortlisted alongside the NWT’s Digawolf for the award.

Her first Juno win follows the release of album Stories from a Downtown Apartment last year.

“Very happy I got to share this moment with most of my family and my great loves,” Cardinal wrote on Facebook following Monday’s announcement.

Making the shortlist for the award gave Tłı̨chǫ artist Diga and his band their second career Juno nomination, coming a decade apart.

“The category is stacked,” Diga had said in January when the nominations were revealed. Digawolf and Cardinal were shortlisted alongside Edmonton’s nêhiyawak and Nunavut’s Northern Haze and Riit.

This year’s Junos, considered Canada’s top music awards, were originally to have been held in mid-March in Saskatoon.

That event was scrapped as the Covid-19 pandemic grew. The awards were instead handed out in an online ceremony three months later.

Shawn Mendes won artist of the year while Loud Luxury were group of the year and Lennon Stella was named 2020’s breakthrough artist.

More: Read the full list of 2020 Juno winners

Billie Eilish won the international award, album of the year was Alessia Cara’s The Pains of Growing, and Avril Lavigne took the fan choice award.

The Dead South, Folk on the Rocks alumni from 2017, won the Juno for traditional roots album of the year for their work Sugar & Joy.